The bankrupt States of America - Some still don't get it

Recently, the GOP suggested reducing the size of the federal work force to avoid a sequester and the effects on the economy.

Comment

Butler County Times Gazette

Writer

Posted Feb. 19, 2013 at 2:13 PM
Updated Feb 19, 2013 at 2:16 PM

Posted Feb. 19, 2013 at 2:13 PM
Updated Feb 19, 2013 at 2:16 PM

Dear Editor:

Recently, the GOP suggested reducing the size of the federal work force to avoid a sequester and the effects on the economy. One of my associates (who supported the GOP candidate in the presidential election) recently stated that reductions in the federal workforce are a problem and will continue until Congress wakes up to see the damage it is doing.

Like most who support the two mainstream parties, his head is stuck in the sand and he refuses to notice the bankrupt state of our country. He is for higher taxes on all except himself. It has been said that democracy is two wolves and one sheep voting on what to have for lunch.

The willingness to vote benefits for ourselves out of somebody else's pocket was long ago predicted when the Scotsman Alexander Tytler stated in the 1700s: "A democracy ... can only exist until the majority discovers it can vote itself largess out of the public treasury. After that, the majority always votes for the candidate promising the most benefits with the result the democracy collapses because of the loose fiscal policy ensuing, always to be followed by a dictatorship, then a monarchy."

This has happened throughout history and is happening now in the United States. I also remember the big to-do over increasing the local sales tax from 3 percent to 4 percent when I was much younger. Now we are truly amazed if we can find a state with a similar tax rate. It shouldn't be higher than 4% since it is based on a percentage of the total sales and not on a bottom line amount. However, it has increased because we keep asking for more and more services(i.e. benefits/largess). If we want our government to survive, we need to ask it for less and less services - but we won't. We have become addicted to the services that our government provides so we keep asking it for more. Money is best spent by those who earn it or as near to that person's level as possible. Big government is always wasteful. To borrow a useful phrase, "The further a dollar travels from the man who earned it and saved it, the more likely it is to be lost doing something that's almost laughably idiotic."

This is why I moved from a mainstream party to the Conservative Party. I invite others to do the same.